Brewing beer is a process which requires a great deal of energy, wherein both electrical energy and thermal energy are required. Taken overall the energy costs represent a considerable share of the total production costs of beer. As a trend it must be assumed that the share of the energy costs will increase further due to the shortage of fossil fuels and the higher energy prices associated with it.
In order to reduce the influence of the energy costs on the production costs attempts have been made in conventional brewery plants to improve the energy recovery and the overall efficiency of the plant. For example, the feed-water is preheated through the cooling of flue gases in an economizer or heated steam is used which, in comparison to normal steam, is more transportable and thus fewer losses arise. In order to render the energy production more economical, cogenerating stations are being increasingly employed, which are used both for producing the electrical power and for the hot water or steam generation. Since they are however similarly based on fossil fuels, they are also not independent of price increases due to the shortage of fossil fuels.